Flight Of White Swan: Tu-160 Fleet Modernization And Expansion

On January 25, 2018, the Russian Ministry of Defense officially announced the contract for the modernization of 10 Tu-160 strategic bombers to the Tu-160M2 standard, to be fulfilled by the Kazan-based S.P. Gorbunov Aviation Plant belonging to the Tupolev Aviation Company, and with the aircraft to be delivered by between 2023 and 2027. The ceremony was marked by a test flight of the first thusly modernized aircraft, named Pyotr Deynekin after the Russian Federation’s first Air Forces’ Chief of Staff.

The order is just the beginning of the modernization and expansion of the Tu-160 bomber force, as the MOD plans to obtain 50 Tu-160M2s by 2035. While some of these aircraft will have been modernized machines either built in the Soviet era or completed in more recent decades using incomplete fuselages constructed already in the 1980s, the rest will be brand-new aircraft. Since the Long-Range Aviation currently operates only 16 Tu-160 bombers, including 5 upgraded Tu-160M1, all of which are based at the Engels airbase near Saratov as part of the 22nd Heavy Bomber Aviation Division, the proposed expansion of the fleet means the Tu-160 will displace the Tu-95MS as the most numerous strategic bomber in Russian service.

Even today, the Tu-160 compares favorably to every other strategic bomber in service. Its maximum take-off weight of 275 tons and payload of 45 tons comfortably exceed that of the US subsonic B-52 bomber. The B-1 bomber, while supersonic, is slower, has a shorter radius of action, and a much lower payload. The B-2 proved a definite disappointment in USAF service, as it currently is not configured as a strategic missile carrier and its stealth is not sufficient to warrant risking these $1 billion aircraft against modern strategic air defense systems like the S-400. While the US has embarked on a yet another strategic bomber program, dubbed the B-21, to replace the existing three types of aircraft, it will be decades before any of these aircraft enter service, if ever.

Thus while the US strategic bomber fleet is in crisis, Russia has a bomber which boasts an enviable combination of characteristics that elude its American counterparts. Intercontinental range even without refuelling, heavy payload, the ability to carry the most advanced Kh-101 and Kh-102 cruise missiles internally in its two payload bays, unlike the Tu-95MS. The modernized Tu-160M2 will expand on its capabilities through the adoption of fully digital avionics, communications, and self-defense systems, and will probably also be adapted to carry the full range of tactical precision-guided stand-off munitions that are being developed for the Su-34 and the Su-57. While the Tu-160 proved its worth in the operations against Syria, its one weakness was the lack of an intermediate set of ordnance to fill the gap between free-fall bombs and heavy cruise missiles like the Kh-101. The exact nature of the modernization has not been described yet, but Russian sources estimate the effectiveness of the Tu-160M2 will be “increased by a factor of 2.5.”

The recent flurry of news reports concerning the Tu-16o fleet also included interesting reports of plans to construct a civilian version of the bomber, with most reports stating the goal is to produce an intercontinental supersonic business jet. Whether this is the main aim of the initiative is debatable, for the civilian version would require an enormous and costly of the bomber, not only to replace the bomb bays, self-defense systems, and military avionics with a passenger cabin and other equipment customary to civilian airliners. What is worse, even the basic construction of the aircraft would have to undergo changes in order to preserve the secrecy of what still is one of the most advanced aviation designs, whose real capabilities are still unknown to the general public. Moreover, the experience of the Concorde and Tu-144 indicates the fuel and maintenance costs of supersonic passenger aircraft make commercial viability a dubious proposition even in cases where a relatively large number of passengers is carried.

The other possibility is that the civilian Tu-160 variant will actually amount to the revival of the Tu-160SK, which was to serve as a satellite launch platform using the Burlak two-stage space launch vehicle. In the current era of competition for space launch business, the future seems to lie with companies capable of reducing the cost of putting satellites into orbit. US-based Space-X is attempting to do that, with mixed success, using a reusable first stage. The Tu-160SK does away with the first stage altogether, since the bomber serves as the first stage, allowing the space booster to be ignited at high altitude and at supersonic speeds. The Tu-160SK redesign would be far simpler than in the case of a passenger aircraft. Tu-160SK models and drawings show an aircraft which, instead of its bomb/missile bays has a single under-fuselage hardpoint for a 50-ton rocket carrying a 1.5 ton payload to a low Earth orbit. Since the Tu-160SK would presumably be operated by a civilian Russian space services firm, there would be little risk of Tu-160 secrets falling into the wrong hands. Ironically, the Tu-160SK would pick up where the failed HAAL, or High Altitude Air Launch, US-Russia-Ukraine consortium which also planned to use Tu-160s for space launches, left off.

Moreover, if the Tu-160SK is the civilian variant Vladimir Putin was referring to, its development would probably also have defense applications. While the Tu-160SK radius of action with a full payload would be reduced to 5,000km, the ability to carry a single, though potentially multi-warhead, ballistic missile, would make it invulnerable to even the longest-ranged air defense systems. The conventional or nuclear aeroballistic missile carried by the Tu-160SK would in turn pose a serious challenge to anti-ballistic missile systems.

The modernization potential of the Tu-160 means that the PAK-DA future heavy bomber program has been pushed off into the future by at least a decade. Nevertheless, the Tu-160 platform will likely incorporate many of the innovations developed for the PAK-DA, ensuring the viability of Russia’s nuclear triad for decades to come.

The Essential Saker II: Civilizational Choices and Geopolitics / The Russian challenge to the hegemony of the AngloZionist Empire

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14 Comments

What a beauty … and what a monstrosity, considering what it’s been designed for. Still, since no Soviet government would have ever launched an unprovoked attack against western targets, and since even today’s ‘democratic’ Russian oligarchy would never dream of launching such an attack, all those Satans, SS-20, Iskanders, Typhoons, Boreis, TU-160s etc. were ever made for was a well deserved retaliation after a surprise attack by the imperialist western countries.

If one day the obscene kindergarten that is the elected leadership of the imperialist western countries comes to its senses, changes its policies and dismantles its deadly military arsenals, then there will be no more need to maintain such costly retaliatory weapons systems … and good riddance to it all, even if some of them did look beautiful.

P.S.: I have posted the same comment a short while back on the English Russia website when they published some images of the newly refurbished TU-160 …

Impressive indeed. When it comes to the US B-2, the following needs to be said. The B-2 is actually a German World War Two design, appropriated by the US Army in 1945, which at the end of World War Two appropriated 1,400 German patents.

The B-2 was used by NATO in the 1999 aggression against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, made up of Serbia and Montenegro. During the 77 bombing campaign, launched without a declaration of war, NATO lost 137 combat aircraft and 25 choppers. Most of the NATO planes were shot down using old Russian AA systems. Among the aircraft shot down was one stealth F-117 (shown on TV) and one stealth B-2 (not shown on TV). The name of the B-2 was “Spirit of Missouri”. The US Air Force is still short of one B-2, stating that it crashed in the US due to “technical” malfunctions. It did not. It was shot down by the Serbs.

By the end of the 77 day air campaign, the only pilots left flying were American and Turkish. All the others had given up. The Serbs did remarkably well. The chief mistake they made was not showing on TV the planes they destroyed and the pilots they captured. That was a huge mistake, which today they bitterly regret. The official policy then was that NATO should not be humiliated. It is now the opinion of experts that had the Serbs shown NATO losses, the air campaign would have stopped. The losses which NATO suffered were a huge shock to NATO HQ in Brussels, which must be wondering how good the S-400 and S-500 missiles systems are. The fact that last year the Syrian military damaged an Israeli F-35 using an old Russian S-200 missile cannot be a source of comfort.

It’s great that the RF is taking seriously the business of countering the nuclear danger coming from the insane Uncle Satan. The military people of the US know that if they allow Donald Duck, I mean Trump, to push his big red button, that it will be the end of the US. This TU-160 is simply more deterrent.

jon
Stealth is a Russian invention, copied by the US. It’s debatable if stealth has any real value, as radar technology is constantly improved. Stealth does not make an aircraft invisible to radar, only partially, and even that is questionable. In 1999 the US lost two stealth aircraft to Serbian AA missiles, one F-117 and one B-2.

Passive stealth relies on low response high absorption materials. The Serbs were able to indirectly see the stealth planes attacking them by tracking stealth made holes across background emission image.
Projected stealth is what Russia has been demonstrating in the skies seas and lands its forces operate in. Projected stealth is interference…collapsing induction fields.
The Russians know what is coming. They understand it is up to them. The Chinese understand and honor Russia’s fate. They will fight alongside her till their dying breath. Such is the kinship bond between these brothers as they face what some hope to make the last day.
Don’t fuck with the Russians.

OK thanks that makes sense. Projected stealth sounds like active stealth, which sounds a lot like electronic jamming to me. Still, I would think they would make an effort to do both? I would imagine this has much to do with budgetary considerations as much as anything…which is not to say this won’t be an effective combat platform. In any event, it is a beautiful aircraft.

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